BEETLES. ?9 



ugly, and none of them of a handsome colour. They 

 live always under the bark, or in the interior of the 

 trunks of trees, where they dig serpentine passages, 

 converting the wood into a mealy dust with which 

 they stop up the entrance to their abode. Here they 

 live, feeding continually on the green wood, for two 

 or three years, until they are ready to metamorphose 

 themselves into cocoons, from which' they afterwards 

 issue as perfect Beetles. 



The numerous species of Capricorn-beetles differ 

 from one another in colour, in the length of their 

 antennae, and also in respect to their size. The Clytus. 

 pictus, for instance, (Plate III. Fig. 13,) is a North 

 American species, and is only a few lines long, while 

 the Prionus Hayesii, a Capricorn-beetle of Western 

 Africa, is nearly five inches long, and one inch broad. 

 Its antennae measure seven inches, and its legs are 

 four inches long. This gigantic Insect is of a dark 

 brown colour, and has many thorns upon the thorax. 



Tlie Painted Capricorn. (Clytus pictus.) 



Plate III. Fig. 13. 



This beautiful Insect is one of our autumnal visitors, 

 and one of the countless host of evidences that the 

 roiling year is full, only as every season brings its 

 own peculiar charms. Spring is the time of youth, 

 of buds, and of flowers; autumn, the harvest of 



